Worship In Heaven Part Ii Series

Worship In Heaven Part II December 7, 2003

Revelation 5

Two weeks ago I preached from Revelation 4 where we got this glimpse into the worship of heaven. John gives us this fantastic description of the throne and the One who sits on the throne. There are amazing colors like gemstones and flashes of lightning and rumblings and claps of thunder. There are 4 fantastic living beings, 24 elders. The living beings cry out day and night;

"Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty,

who was, and is, and is to come."

9Whenever the living creatures give glory, honor and thanks to him who sits on the throne and who lives for ever and ever, 10the twenty-four elders fall down before him who sits on the throne, and worship him who lives for ever and ever. They lay their crowns before the throne and say:

11"You are worthy, our Lord and God,

to receive glory and honor and power,

for you created all things,

and by your will they were created

and have their being."

I talked about how we are to worship God at all times because Worship is what we are created for first and foremost.

We worship because God is holy

We worship by laying our crowns before God

Jesus

All for Jesus

All I am and have

And ever hope to be

All of my ambitions

Hopes and plans

I surrender these

Into Your hands

We worship because God is worthy – he created all things.

I want to preach that sermon all over again – I don’t know if you enjoyed it, but I did, preach it was an act of worship in itself! And then we worshiped, and some of you stayed until 2pm continuing to worship God.

It would be great to stay in that place, and sing those songs over again, but John continues to see more in the throne-room, and he speaks of a new song that is sung!

Let’s read Revelation 5 – again lets read the parts that are set apart out loud together

The Scroll

While John is taking in the scene from chapter 4, he notices that God, the one who sits on the throne, is holding a scroll in his right hand. We see later that the scroll is what is to come in the history of the world, it is God’s sovereign plan. An Angel booms out, “Who is worthy to break the seals and open the scroll?” And John begins to weep because there is no one who steps forward. He cries not just because his own curiosity won’t be satisfied, but he weeps at the prospect of an indefinite postponement of God’s final and decisive action.

Just as when I have to tell my kids not to be scared in a movie because they always turn out good, an elder (who knows how the story ends) says to John, "Do not weep! See, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has triumphed. He is able to open the scroll and its seven seals."

He is talking about Jesus, and he is using this glorious language – Lion of Judah

When Jacob blesses his sons, this is what he says to Judah:

Genesis 49:9-10

You are a lion’s cub, O Judah;

you return from the prey, my son.

Like a lion he crouches and lies down,

like a lioness-who dares to rouse him?

The scepter will not depart from Judah,

nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet,

Root of David

Isaiah 11

1 A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse;

from his roots a Branch will bear fruit.

2 The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him-

the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding,

the Spirit of counsel and of power,

the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD -

3 and he will delight in the fear of the LORD .

He will not judge by what he sees with his eyes,

or decide by what he hears with his ears;

4 but with righteousness he will judge the needy,

with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the earth.

He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth;

with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked.

5 Righteousness will be his belt

and faithfulness the sash around his waist.

…10 In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples; the nations will rally to him, and his place of rest will be glorious

John looks up ready to see this glorious, victorious lion roaring with might ready to rip the seals from the scroll, what he sees is a dead lamb. “6Then I saw a Lamb, looking as if it had been slain,”